U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell meets audience members before a debate with opponent Mike McGavick a week ago at the Spokane Club.

U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell meets audience members before a debate with opponent Mike McGavick a week ago at the Spokane Club.

Photo: Joshua Trujillo/Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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Election 2006: Cantwell touts victories amid contradictions

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WASHINGTON -- Slowly and methodically, like the hidebound Senate itself, Maria Cantwell was winning a reputation in 2004.

When she arrived three years earlier, Cantwell was one of the first senators to peel back the layers of deceit that Enron used to manipulate the West Coast energy market and drive electric bills skyward. Cantwell emerged as a leader for her party on energy issues.

On this day in June 2004, Cantwell had struck gold: Audiotapes obtained by authorities of Enron traders talking openly about rigging the system. Cantwell called a news conference.

Except the audio system wouldn't work. Finally, an aide was forced to hold a tape recorder awkwardly next to a microphone. The sound quality was poor and there was no direct connection for TV, which meant the tapes probably wouldn't make the nightly news.

The episode provides the perfect metaphor for Cantwell's first term in office as she seeks to win re-election to a second, six-year term.

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It is a real-life illustration of a lawmaker who even critics say is whip smart and who fiercely defends Washington state's interests as she sees them. It was a testament to someone who isn't afraid to dive deep into the details of complex issues even if the political rewards are uncertain.

But for all her work and acumen, that day in June highlights a less fortunate Cantwell trait: Her uncanny ability to step on her own best lines and to muddle the message. It coincides with her tendency to obscure her accomplishments in tortured syntax. The disconnect is amplified by what some say is Cantwell's aloof manner.

Republicans mock her as Senator Cant-speak-well.

Supporters insist that hidden amid those dense, fractured comments is a true populist, one who has waged high-profile campaigns against Enron and price gouging by oil companies and lesser-known battles such as making miles-per-gallon estimates on new cars more accurate. They point to the 48-year-old senator with a high-tech pedigree as the vanguard of a new type of lawmaker who will transform the musty institution and its ancient ways.

Complex record

These are the contradictions that voters in Washington must reconcile over the next two weeks as they decide whether Cantwell deserves a second term. In the process they must come to grips with a senator who has scored some major victories and earned praise from a range of interest groups.

She has a perfect score from the League of Conservation Voters, an environmental group. Much of the score derived from her role as the principle opponent to drilling for oil in an Alaskan wilderness and for being a leading advocate of alternative fuels.

Closer to home, Cantwell has not shied away from the small, but important, issues that affect voters. She's gone to Cuba and Mexico to try and open those markets for Washington apples, potatoes and lentils. One of the first issues she embraced after coming to Capitol Hill was to force the Forest Service to better train crews that battle wildfires. That change came after four firefighters were killed in the Thirtymile Fire in July 2001.

Yet this is the same senator who gave President Bush permission to invade Iraq and who twice voted in favor of the Patriot Act. This is the same senator who arrived in Washington, D.C., by way of a 2,229-vote victory, a margin that made her a hero to Democrats and despised by Republicans.

This is the same senator who angered some environmentalists for not being more outspoken on legislation that sets the rules for commercial fishing and for voting to confirm of former Interior Secretary Gale Norton. She also angered many Democrats by refusing to be more forceful in denouncing the war in Iraq. Cantwell declines to apologize for her Iraq vote but has said the U.S. should begin bringing troops home.

Cantwell, in a September interview in her Capitol Hill office, said her record isn't as odd and disjointed as it appears.

"I think they see I don't just let things drift by in the Senate but I'll stand up to stop the bad things but I'll dig in and work across party lines to get things done that are important to our state. I can be effective even in this (partisan) environment," she said, in an effort to explain both her record and her approach to the job.

Cantwell's record over the last six years is a reflection of her persistence and the difficulty a young lawmaker has breaking through in an institution that is a slave to seniority.

"It's hard to make an impact on the Senate when you are a freshman in the minority," said Jennifer Duffy, who monitors the Senate for the Cook Political Report, a non-partisan and respected publication that focuses on Congress.

Duffy said it was all the more difficult for Cantwell because Washington's senior senator, Democrat Patty Murray, was running for re-election in 2004. The reality shifted most of the attention to Murray, Duffy said. And it didn't hurt that Murray was a senior member of the Appropriations Committee, which meant she could direct millions of dollars in federal spending to the state.

Cantwell, meanwhile, serves on the Energy Committee and the Commerce Committee, panels that handle issues important to Washington state such as fisheries, aviation and hydropower but often get bogged down in wonkish debates that are hard for the average citizen to translate into tangible results.

Even Cantwell acknowledges the dilemma.

"I'll never forget when I was thinking of what committees to get on, then-(Energy) Secretary (Bill) Richardson called me about something," Cantwell said, recalling her first days in the Senate in early 2001.

"I told him I was thinking of getting on the Energy Committee and he said, 'Oh, I don't know if I'd do that.' This is coming from the Secretary of Energy. He said, 'They never pass any major energy legislation, so why get on there?' "

But as Cantwell was taking office the world was changing. The California energy crisis was spilling into the Northwest and was becoming a national issue. In later years, the Energy Committee would become ground zero for high-profile battles over drilling for oil in Alaska, the soaring price of gas and, to a lesser extent, how to clean up Hanford.

Making friends, enemies

Cantwell registered some successes. She joined with Republican Sen. Mike Enzi of Wyoming to pass an identity-theft bill that gives victims more power to repair their stolen reputation and credit rating.

"I'm very proud of that privacy bill that doesn't always get a whole lot of attention," she said. "But the fact that you can protect people who have identify theft and I had a bill that went through a Republican Congress."

She successfully added language to the energy bill to provide federal funding to develop biofuels. Another amendment established a research center at the University of Washington to accelerate the use of composite materials in aircraft. That achievement dovetailed nicely with Boeing's plans to use composites in its new 787 airliner.

For the most part, however, Cantwell's "successes" came from her ability as a senator to stop initiatives that she believed would harm the Northwest.

In what has become an annual exercise, Cantwell and other Northwest senators have defeated repeated White House attempts to tamper with the Bonneville Power Administration's finances. She also helped protect the interests of those who own and operate hydropower dams.

She, along with others in the delegation, fought to protect funding for cleaning up Hanford. Most prominently, she was the leader in the Democrats' successful effort to prohibit drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge in Alaska.

That high-profile outcome gained her a lifelong enemy in Sen. Ted Stevens, the senior Republican from Alaska who is one of the Senate's most powerful members.

"I will go to every state and tell them what you've done," Stevens said from the Senate floor in December, glaring at Cantwell. "I will go to Washington state many, many times. I'm going to explain the bill to everybody in the country. This has been the saddest day in my life."

There were also disappointments. Cantwell was unable to convince the Senate to provide more money to extend unemployment benefits after 9/11, a failure felt in the Northwest as Boeing was hit hard after the attacks.

She claimed a mixed victory when Congress agreed to allow Washington state residents and taxpayers in six other states to deduct sales taxes from their federal returns. But Cantwell was unable to convince Congress to make the deduction permanent. Independent analysts say Cantwell has performed like many freshmen senators who by custom usually find themselves overshadowed by more senior colleagues.

Republican challenger Mike McGavick has criticized Cantwell for not doing more. Her activities, he says, are usually on the "periphery" or focused on stopping legislation. Republicans have criticized Cantwell for funneling $11 million in federal funds to the clients of Ron Dotzauer, her former campaign manager and boyfriend. Dotzauer also owes Cantwell between $15,000 and $50,000 on a personal loan that Cantwell made before she was elected.

Michael Meehan, a senior adviser to Cantwell, dismisses suggestions that Cantwell was serving a friend. "It's cynical to imply that her efforts for the Northwest were swayed because she is owed money from a friend," Meehan said.

Though Cantwell has declined to speak about Dotzauer, she is unapologetic about her approach to the job.

"I try to make things about policy, not politics. That's how I've been able to get things passed here in the minority," she said.

"The administration has pushed people and focused on the political instead of focusing on the policy."

Duffy, the independent analyst, says Cantwell has positioned herself well. "Cantwell is politically smart," Duffy said. "She knows her weak spots and has worked very hard to shore them up. But ... she comes across as very distant."

That profile of Cantwell is pervasive. But not to Cantwell. When asked what she likes best about campaigning, she doesn't hesitate.

"I love retail campaigning. I like getting out there, yeah. I like the parades; I like meeting people," she said.

She's also absolute about which Washington she prefers.

"I love Washington state. That hardest part of my job is living here," she said from Capitol Hill. "It's a nice city and whatever, but I love everything about the Northwest.

"I like the way people think there better. I think they're open. There's a lot of innovation."

Pressed to explain further, Cantwell reveals her ultimate agenda.

"I'm here trying to get the rest of the country to think a little more like we do," she said. "I see my job as taking those ideas, that creativity; it doesn't matter what the issue is. It's like the Northwest is already ahead and pushing the envelope on some of these problems."